A cold snap has everyone in the town of Toby Mills feeling down, until the mayor's wife thinks of a way to warm things up again.

Presents a story inspired by human love, how people take care of one another, and how choices resonate through subsequent generations. Afghanistan, 1952. Abdullah and his sister Pari live with their father and step-mother in the small village of Shadbagh. Their father, Saboor, is constantly in search of work and they struggle together through poverty and brutal winters. To Abdullah, Pari, as beautiful and sweet-natured as the fairy for which she was...

"Judith can't speak. But when her close-knit community of Roswell Station is attacked by enemies, Judith is forced to choose: continue to live in silence, or recover her voice"--

During World War I, the influenza pandemic ultimately killed more people around the world than the war itself. The Last Town on Earth takes as its launching point a striking historical footnote: some uninfected towns were so terrified of the surrounding flu that they closed their entrances, posted signs warning strangers not to enter, and even stationed armed guards to make sure no outsiders brought infection into their communities. Mullen incisively...

"On the day Juliet Lansdown reports to work for the first time at Bethnal Green Library, it isn't the bustling hub she's been expecting. But in the face of German attacks, she's determined to make it a place where all of their neighbors feel safe and welcome. Katie Upwood is thrilled to be working at the library too, though she's only there until she heads off to university in the fall. But after the death of her beau on the front lines and unexpected...

"A woman sits in her apartment in an unnamed English city, absorbed in watching the dramas of her neighbors through their windows. Traumatized into muteness after a long, devastating trip from war-torn Syria to the UK, she believes that she wants to sink deeper into isolation, moving between memories of her absent boyfriend and family and her homeland, dreams, and reality. At the same time, she begins writing for a magazine under the pseudonym "the...

A bestselling novel of suburban daydreams and the magic of one woman who makes her own way in the world  On Hemlock Street, the houses are identical, the lawns tidy, and the families traditional. A perfect slice of suburbia, this Long Island community shows no signs of change as the 1950s draw to a close-until the fateful August morning when Nora Silk arrives.   Recently divorced, Nora mows the lawn in slingback pumps and climbs her roof in the...

Steinbeck’s tough yet charming portrait of people on the margins of society, dependant on one another for both physical and emotional survival
A Penguin Classic
Published in 1945, Cannery Row focuses on the acceptance of life as it is: both the exuberance of community and the loneliness of the individual. Drawing on his memories of the real inhabitants of Monterey, California, including longtime friend Ed Ricketts,...

"A young graffiti artist learns to fight smart against the gentrification threatening her neighborhood"--

"A picture book about how family and community help shape the wonderful people our children become"--